The Difference Between Violent And Nonviolent Offenders In Empathy: An Event-Related Brain Potential Study

As a variable which can encourages prosocial behavior and restrain antisocial behavior,empathy plays an important role in the studies of aggressive behavior. A lot of studies about the relationship between aggressive behavior and empathy proved that there was positive correlation between low empathy and aggressive behavior. And violent crime is a kind of extreme aggressive behavior. Some studies proved that there was distinct difference between violent and nonviolent offenders in empathy, but most of these studies employed questionnaire or fMRI methods of assessing empathy. In this study, violent offenders and nonviolent offenders were presented with some painful and neural photos and performed a pain judgment task, and behavioral data and ERPs (event-related potentials) were recorded during the task. The author wanted to arouse empathy for pain and investigate the difference between violent offenders and nonviolent offenders in empathy. The ERPs results showed that there was difference between painful and neutral stimuli in all of subjects. The P3 amplitude difference between painful and neutral stimuli was significantly smaller in violent offenders than in the nonviolent offenders. It maybe prove that cognitive empathy of violent offenders was lower than nonviolent offenders. And The N2 amplitude (absolute value of painful stimuli minus neutral stimuli) was significantly lower in violent offenders than in nonviolent offenders. It maybe prove that affective empathy of violent offenders was lower than nonviolent offenders.